Over the years, many readers have asked us, “can I use X or Y investment for an emergency fund?”. Therefore it may be useful to list all such eligible investments and discuss which is suitable for whom. Perhaps if you have just started your career and your net worth is low, the following statement may…

A reader asks, “How can I calculate my safe withdrawal rate when I retire 25 years from now? I am 30”. What does the term “safe withdrawal rate” mean? The safe withdrawal rate, or SWR, refers to the amount of money that can be withdrawn annually from a retirement fund in the first year of…

Many young earners ask themselves, “What percentage of my salary should I invest monthly? Would 10% suffice, or should it be 20%?” They typically seek a quick and easy way to determine if they’re on the right path and to alleviate any guilt associated with their spending habits. Regrettably, this is one of several flawed…

A Financial Health Check Tool developed by M. Pattabiraman is now available at SEBI’s Investor Education Portal. A prototype was tested in Jan 2023 with members of the Facebook group Asan Ideas for Wealth, and their feedback was implemented. Later, the SEBI Investor Protection Education Fund Advisory Committee gave further feedback, and the tool has…

In this article, we consider non-financial aspects of planning for our children’s future. We have already covered the basics of how to be financially ready for college expenses. We shall limit ourselves to “doing well” in school and college although there is ample overlap with all walks of life. Many people have the incorrect opinion…

By now, everyone knows the drill. For a long term goal, you can have 50-60% of equity exposure (preferably in an index fund) and the rest in fixed income. Get set, go. Sadly, the race has just begun, and there are plenty of pit stops to worry about. The number of people who care about…

A reader says, “My income is quite low. Is there any hope for me? How do I go about creating a retirement corpus?” The rules of personal finance are the same regardless of income and net worth. Those earning less feel like they will never have the experiences or wealth of those who earn more….

In this article, we explain how to track the progress of our financial goals. We use the freefincal robo advisory tool for this purpose as many readers and users are interested in knowing how. The robo tool, as many readers would know, is a financial planning tool. It automates the systematic risk management process and…

A reader says, “Please make a video/article on how an investor should reach an Equity: Debt asset allocation of 60:40 if most of his/her investments are in debt already (almost 90% in debt), especially for investors between 35 to 40 age group”. “I understand that from your rebalancing articles, you mentioned that in such scenarios,…

A reader says, “I created a financial plan using your robo-advisory tool. It was quite useful to understand where I stand, but I am now scared because I do not have enough to invest for my long-term goals. What should I do?” This is a fairly common situation; most of us start our investment journey…

A reader wants to know which mutual fund he should use for rebalancing – outperformers or underperformers in a portfolio—a discussion. The primary objective of portfolio rebalancing is risk reduction. We remove some funds from an asset class performing well and shift it to another asset class. Typically this is done from equity to fixed…

Here are a few money managment tips to consider before buying a house. These involve servicing the home loan and investments and are unrelated to the property purchase. Don’t be in a hurry! Buying property is often an emotional decision and even more frequently driven by a fear of missing out. These can result in…

It is the dream and responsibility of every parent to guarantee that our children have the freedom and ability to pursue their desired path in life. Additionally, it would be ideal for our children to begin their professional journey without the burden of an educational loan. So it is vital that we strategically plan and…

We present a simple spreadsheet to review and audit your goal-based investment portfolios. Over the years, we recognised the need for a tool beyond financial planning and portfolio value/return tracking. A financial planning calculator tells you the target corpus for a goal and the investment amount required.  A portfolio tracker only tells you the current…